There were no gradually ascending foothills. From the almost flat but flower-spotted grassy prairie—for the sage brush is almost unknown here—the dusty travelers were whirled like the flash of a moving picture into the wonders of the mountain world. Midvale marks the southern boundary of the Glacier National Park—the old Lewis and Clark reservation that extends into the heart of the mountains, and 135 miles north to the Canadian boundary.
There was no thought of dinner. From seven o’clock until darkness finally blotted out the view of peak and range; of chasm and precipice; of matted and tangled forest; mountain streams and veil-like falls, the entire party sat on the observation platform. It was “Ah” and “Oh,” “Here, quick,” and “Look there,” until necks were stiff and eyes ached.
“Wonderful!” exclaimed Captain Ludington.
“Them trees?” queried Sam Skinner. “You bet they are; all o’ that. You couldn’t make five mile a day in ’em. And we got a good deal o’ that down timber in the Elk River Valley. It’s easier to look at than to cut a trail through.”
Then came dinner after one of the longest and fullest days the boys had ever known. The branch line, on which the Teton was to be hauled to Michel and across the Canadian border into Canada, left the main line at Rexford—well up in the mountains. The limited was due there at a little after midnight. There the special car would be sidetracked to await the leaving of the branch road train at four o’clock the next day.
Mr. Mackworth suggested that every one turn in as there would be plenty of time later for sight-seeing. But the boys, visiting the rear platform after the evening meal, were so entranced with the scene that they hastened to summon the others of the party. The laboring train had crawled well up into the ruggeder mountain heights. And now, on a higher level, it was whirling along on the shoulder of the mountains; swinging around great cliffs on a roadbed cut in their face; now and then shooting through a tunnel or over a spidery trestle, and then getting new impetus on a tangent following the bed of some foaming stream.
The moon had risen and all the world in sight was either the black of the chasms or the silvery glisten of moonlit pines. But what interested Frank and Phil was not so much this glory of nature’s panorama as the song of the train as it sped in and out of narrow places; panted under new grades or breathed full and deep under restful downward grades, and then vied with the echo of its own engine noises as they were caught up and hurled back by unseen precipices.
“There,” exclaimed Frank, grasping Captain Ludington’s arm, “you can tell we’re goin’ up again even when you can’t see anything. Listen!”
“Chuc-a-chung, chuc-a-chung-chuc-a-chung,” rolled back from the engine.